


imbedded within the walls of flesh and passing for what is most commonly recognized as human

by Anonymous



Series: dog teeth [7]
Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Blood and Violence, Canon Divergent, Discussion of past rape/non-con, Imprisonment, Manhandling, No SBI dynamics here, Phil and Techno are in no way related, Phil and techno can be interpreted as queerplatonic if you feel so inclined, Platonic Bed Sharing, Platonic Hand Holding, References to a Panic Attack, References to past CSA, Sort Of, at all, references to past rape/non-con, the last three tags all only happen to Dream, they are just Very Good Friends, very very good friends, vicarious trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-25
Updated: 2021-01-25
Packaged: 2021-03-18 02:35:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,391
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28984974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Technoblade finds out what happened, marches Dream to the prison, and shoulders the aftermath of everything along the way.
Series: dog teeth [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2069550
Comments: 36
Kudos: 342





	imbedded within the walls of flesh and passing for what is most commonly recognized as human

**Author's Note:**

> **Read the rest of the[series](https://archiveofourown.org/series/2069550) for this to make any amount of sense. **
> 
> Title is from Tom Waits poem "Army Ants". A poem better listened to than read. It's on [Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/track/5GVCi5NWUA1nqvVW7YSweb?si=OeYDmhDXRqq5bj2l-l08PQ) if you get curious. 
> 
> This is Technoblade's pov starting from finding Ranboo on the steps of his cabin and after. No SBI dynamics. I'm going with canon and saying everyone (besides Wilbur and Phil) are not related in any way in this series. 
> 
> **Content warnings** : There's callbacks to [ this part](https://archiveofourown.org/works/28962561) and the use of cameras in the worst use of Chekov's Gun possible.  
> Fic!Dream is still a vile man in this. He is his own content warning.  
> Someone gets hunted in the forest, a tooth knocked out, and choked (it's Dream).

One common trend he noticed, was that the kids he ended up having to carry around, weighed as much as a small sack of potatoes. Ranboo barely even registered as anything to him, the kid practically skin and bones, all gangly limbs and no substance, and he didn't really know what they were feeding people in L'Manberg, but it obviously wasn't enough. 

And this was the second time he had dragged a kid, bloody and busted up, to the hearth in his home. Phil would have been good to have around for this, so he wouldn't have to shoulder the whole responsibility of making sure Ranboo didn't do something completely stupid; like die. He prepped some water to boil on the stove, chucked in a few logs, tried to remember everything he knew about treating potential hypothermia and drew so many blanks his head might as well have sounded like an empty fax machine. 

He wasn't a doctor, and he certainly wasn't a healer. He was more the guy who sent people _to_ those places. And he thought about calling Phil, he really did, but his hands also weren't as steady as he would have liked them to be. He wasn't blind. He hadn't missed the patterned bruising on Ranboo. The shapes of hands and fingers and he wasn't prone to throwing up or feeling ill, but boy, did that make him consider the rim of a bucket a bit. 

Tommy was freaking out too. He could tell. The kid was less than subtle. Tommy didn't like being called on it. All hunch-backed and growly, truly a little raccoon caught with his hand in the garbage can, as if he didn't see him doing it all right in front of him. There was something going on though. Some way the two connected, like dots on a map and the geography was all foreign to him, but he knew what squiggles were mountains, which lines were rivers, and the more he stared at it the more he drew the two points together. 

He knew Dream was the common denominator here. No math whiz himself, sure, but it didn't take a genius to figure it out. His blood roiled, teeth grit and tusks itchy with the familiar need to drive them into the side of someone's face until he tore their cheek down to grinning skull. Yeah. Next time he saw that guy he would have to work real hard not to tear him limb from limb. 

He really should call Phil though. He really should. Because now there were two kids-- two teenages, really-- huddled and shivering and shaking in his house. One with so much anger he thought Tommy might actually explode, the other with teeth grit pain that Ranboo tried to cover up. He knew what hiding a wound looked like. Unfortunately, he was pretty sure _all_ of Ranboo was the wound. And that-- Well, frankly, he didn't exactly know how to heal that up. 

Tommy stormed off, door slamming behind him and he had half a mind to chase the idiot into the snow, drag him back inside so he didn't lose one kid after gaining another. He stepped for the door-- 

"Uhm, I think it's better if you give him some time." 

"You the expert on all things Tommy or something?" 

"No," Ranboo huffed out a laugh and then winced, a hand holding his side. "But uhm, I don't think he wants to stick around for this." 

"For what?" He asked, cautiously, slowly, like the kid was the snake, all red on yellow, and not whoever had bruised and bloodied him. 

"I--" Ranboo glanced away and the kid's shoulders ticked up. "I have to tell you some… Things." 

"Uh…" That sounded particularly ominous. And why did he have to get stuck with the cryptic one, at least Tommy just shouted at him and called him 'bitch'. At least he knew what the heck he was saying. "Things like…?" 

"Uhm--" 

"You should honestly probably eat that first, before you do anything." He nodded towards the gapple in Ranboo's lap. 

"Oh. Right… Yeah." The Ranboo picked it up, taking a cautious bite, and hopefully it would take away some of the mottled colors painting the kid's skin.

"Also I, uh, made this--" He set the mug down, far enough away he didn't get too close, but close enough Ranboo could lean over and grab it. "It's just some tea, don't know if you really need to warm up or not. Not really an expert on all things, uh...enderpeople."

Besides killing them. But he wasn't gonna tell this kid that last part out loud. That would be, as Tommy said, _'fucked up'._

"Thank you." 

"Yup." 

Man, he really needed to call Phil. 

"Uh… One sec actually, I gotta just make a quick--" He held up his hand towards his ear and Ranboo seemed to get the message. 

Ranboo nodded, hands wrapped around the mug, and it looked less like he was comforted by it and more like it hurt with the way his brow furrowed and his fingers tensed around it. Yeah, he wasn't gonna analyze that. 

"Hey, Phil?" 

The connection went through with a crunchy ping. 

_"Techno?"_

"Would you mind, uh… popping in for a sec."

_"Like right now, or…?"_

His eyes trailed back to Ranboo who stared at the tea in the mug and barely moved, barely even breathed. "Right now would be ideal."

_"Alright, mate, see you in a bit."_

The communicator line faded and he rubbed at his ear. Yeah he really hated using that thing. He turned back to Ranboo who had finally abandoned the mug, none of it drank from, and the apple half eaten. The bruises faded, back less hunched, sitting less awkward and tilted, and sides no longer hitching with the tell-tale signs of a broken or bruised rib.

"Feeling better?" 

"Yeah, uhm… thanks." 

"Tommy steals enough of my gapples as it is, I figure what's one more out the door." 

Ranboo breathes out of his nose sharply, an airy chuckle that turns back into furrowed brows and frowns. 

"Uh, so--" He paused. "What did you need to tell me?" 

"Right. Uhm, should we-- Should I sit at the table or here or--" 

He shrugged. "Up to you." 

"The table works." 

"Alright." He settled into a chair, watched Ranboo awkwardly fold himself into the other and he wasn't sure how he ended up here again, with a teenager sat across from him and something to do with Dream about to leave their mouth. 

"I don't-- Uhm-- Well…" Ranboo fidgeted with the edge of the table, not meeting his eyes at all. "Dream is--" 

"Dream is what?" 

"He's not a good person." 

"Uh… alright. Was there anything else you wanted to add to that or are we just stating the obvious here?" 

Ranboo covered his mouth, uncovered it, rubbed at his jaw and then wrapped his arms around himself and seemed to really struggle with coming up with his next words, eyes frantically darting over the table. 

Ranboo opened his mouth after what felt like a minute, or maybe it was less and the awkward silence just made it feel longer, and-- "He raped me." 

"Uh…" His brain halted, tuning into an all static channel as he tried to make sense of what he had just heard leave Ranboo's mouth. "Uh…" 

And he was stuck on that. Stuck on it, because Ranboo was a teenager, a kid. Maybe he was a couple years shaved off from adulthood, but he was a kid. He shouldn't have those words leaving his mouth at all. Nothing like that should have ever left his mouth, and his ears were slowly catching up with the rest of him as his heart did that annoying stuttering thing and his diaphragm clenched. 

"He--" He couldn't even force it past his own lips. 

"Not just once it was--" Ranboo scrubbed at his cheeks with his knuckles, hunched and curled in on himself. "I think it happened a lot. I don't know… It's-- I remember some of it-- But it's--" 

"I'm…" 

What was he supposed to say? What the hell was he supposed to say? He wished Phil was here. Phil could at least _pretend_ to know what to say instead of just staring and being stuck two minutes in the past where Ranboo had never said any of those words. 

"Yeah-- Uhm, and he-- Tommy didn't want to tell you yet, but he--" 

His brow furrowed, fists clenching against where he had rested them on the table. He was glad he didn't have them clung to the edge because he's pretty sure he would have torn chunks out of the wood. 

"He hurt Tommy too and--" Ranboo huffed out a breath, voice high and tight and edging close to something like panicky. "Yeah-- So, we-- We need to-- I--I think we need stop him before he hurts Tubbo or someone else or--" 

"Where is he now?" He asked, voice low, dropped somewhere below his sternum, more a growl than anything man or civilized. 

Ranboo flinched and he tried to compose himself. He couldn't scare this kid, Ranboo didn't need him all snarling and bestial, he had to be calm. He needed to be a grounding point for all the stuff that had just left Ranboo's mouth, like the kid was reading off the recent news from L'Manberg and not telling him he had been-- 

"Uhm, he--" Ranboo rubbed at the back of his neck, folded further into himself. "He was... following me. But he left me in the forest after he--" Ranboo swallowed, hands coming up to guard his neck. "I-- I mean I don't really know where he went after. I couldn't really-- It was hard to, uhm, move for a bit."

He thought back to literally just before this, before the gapple took away most the evidence, to finding Ranboo on the steps, finger-shaped imprints purpled around his neck, blood on his mouth, on his chin, clothes unkempt, ruffled, like they had been hastily thrown back on and his shirt was still off by a button or two, uneven at the collar. And he didn't want to think about how shaky and uncoordinated someone's hands would have to be to mess up that bad. About how, maybe, he was morbidly glad Ranboo's suit was dark, because he couldn't see where any blood had collected and maybe that wasn't a good thought to have, but he felt extremely unwell even thinking about any of this and-- 

Phil opened the door, shaking snow off his wings with a flick and stopping at the sight of Ranboo. 

"Uh… Hello?" 

"Phil, we--" He started, rubbing a hand over his face. "There's a bit of a situation." 

Ranboo just waved half-heartedly, the smile on his face more reflexive and defensive than real. 

Phil's eyes darted between them. "What's the… situation?" 

"Dream has apparently--" He swallowed the words foul on his tongue. "Uh, Dream's got a bit of a track record with, uh…" 

He glanced to Ranboo, who watched him with open eyes, too trusting, like he figured now that he knew he would somehow solve it all. And sure, yeah, that was his job, right? As the adult, when a kid tells you something, you're supposed to have all the answers. That was how it worked. He sure didn't have all the answers here though. 

"A track record with what, Techno?" Phil asked, his voice dropping, wings tensing up behind him. 

"Well…" He rubbed at his chin. "He's apparently got a habit of uh… sleeping with minors." 

Not sleeping with. That wasn't the right word. He should have said 'raping', but that felt violent, bloody, and he had seen a lot of gore in his time, but it would feel like he had reached over and ripped out Ranboo's spine if he said it. 

" _What_?" Phil asked and he kind of felt bad that Ranboo had to say it all over again. 

"Uhm--" Ranboo fidgeted, voice quiet, eyes down-turned. "He's-- For the past few weeks, I think he's--" The half-ender huffed out a breath. "He's been touching me and-- And other things… and he--" Ranboo swallowed, arms drawn tight to his chest. "Uhm, he…raped me and I-- I think he tried to make me forget most of it, but that wasn't--" Ranboo huffed out a nervous breathy and choked laugh. "Well, that obviously wasn't very successful." 

Phil hissed in a sharp breath, eyes pinching, narrowing, wings hiking up and feathers flaring and puffing and he could tell Phil was pissed, see it in the rigid clench of his jaw and the way he straightened his back and tensed his shoulders. The man turned his eyes to him and he knew he was thinking all similar thoughts to Phil in that moment.

"We need to go to L'Manberg," Phil said, low and quiet. 

"Wait-- We should get Tommy first…" Ranboo started, eyes darting to the door. 

He hated using the communicator, hated it more than he hated a lot of things, but he tried to get it to set up a connection with Tommy and it pinged back; empty, the line dead. 

"Uh…" He paused. "Ranboo?" 

Ranboo had gone rigid. "He took his out, he doesn't have it anymore, you can't-- No one can call him."

Good to know he actually needed to be proactive in prying things out of Tommy like that before they became a problem. 

" _Fuck_..." Phil grit out, already heading for the door. 

"You don't think--?" Ranboo started, cutting himself off. 

"You said Dream had followed you and then left you behind? Do you know where he was going after that? What he planned on doing?" He asked, standing, already trailing after Phil.

"N-- No, I don't-- I can't-- I can't remember. I can't--" Ranboo looked down and then up. "I can't remember." 

"It's fine, it's fine… Uh... Tommy's probably just got his head stuck in a tree somewhere like an idiot. We'll spread out and see if we find him before we jump to any conclusions, alright?" He tried to reassure him, but unease gnawed around his middle.

Ranboo nodded and plodded off into the snow beside Phil. 

They didn't find Tommy. Not after thirty minutes. Not after an hour. And when they reconvened it was somber and heavy and thick with the knowledge that something was very, very wrong. Ranboo called Tubbo, went all kinds of stiff-limbed and wide-eyed and shaky at whatever he heard and when the half-ender relayed the little jury-rigged court scene to him and Phil. He gnashed his teeth, tusks clicking and lip curling.

"We need to go back. We need to-- We need to let everyone know what's happening and-- And--" Ranboo huffed out, quick and too fast and his breathing didn't slow.

Phil placed a hand on his shoulder and the half-ender flinched, but it seemed to at least distract him from the encroaching panic. 

"What the fuck are we gonna do when we find him?" Phil asked, to him only.

He knew Phil would run him through, stab a sword straight through Dream's chest until the man twitched and stilled at the hilt of his blade and bled over his fist. But if they killed him, the little roach would spring back. Nastier and more resilient than before. Naw, they had to let everyone know somehow. They had to make sure everyone knew what kind of person Dream was. And they needed to lock him up somewhere. Somewhere they always knew where he was and where he couldn't slip under the door or scuttle out of a crack in the wall.

"Uh… I think I have a plan." 

The arrival to L'Manberg was met with a frantic Tubbo, asking question after question and then him falling silent when they explained the situation and then more explanations to even more people. Ranboo lingered at the back of it all, staring blankly, arms wrapped around himself, seemingly trying to go unnoticed. And Ranboo had told him and Phil it was fine if people knew, that they needed to know, but he could tell that every time it came up it weighed a little bit harder on the kid's shoulders.

Everything passed in blurs and snapshots and they tried to work fast. Gathering all those they could in person, before they contacted those they couldn't find, going down a list of people and crossing off names until every single person knew. And then, with his own plan in mind, they headed for the beach, for Tommy's original exile spot, where he remembered coming to mock the kid the first time. Where he had shown up to humiliate and poke fun at him like some schoolyard bully. And that sat heavy on his shoulders as they closed in on the tent. 

They had gotten there in time, Ranboo had been right in the sense that Dream would drag it out, would bat Tommy around like a mouse before finally going for the spine. He met Phil's eyes from across the tent, and he hadn't quite seen them like that in a long time. Tommy peeked around Phil's wing, arms huddled around himself and he looked small. Smaller than he should. 

He wrenched Dream out into the open when the man hesitated, set his axe aside, and pulled Dream's arms behind his back. Dream didn't even struggle, he just hung his head, shoulders rising and falling, and it was too calm to be defeat. He tied the bonds too tight, knew he did when Dream hissed between his teeth, and he didn't care. He should be picking up that axe and chopping every single finger off until his hands were just bloody mits, but that's probably what Dream wanted him to do. Expected him to do.

The easy road was torture, the pleasant road was death. 

Grabbing Dream's arm, he marched him along, shook him when he tried to speak, didn't let him linger on Tommy or on the crowd he stepped him through. And for the first time he felt Dream flinch under his hand, cow and lean away and he knew the man had realized what this was. This was a stage performance. This was a showcase. An exhibition. And he was the centerpiece on display for all of them to gawk at. Pushing him to kneel in the sand he gripped the sides of the mask and ripped at it until the buckles snapped and it whipped Dream's head forward with the force. 

"You could've just undone it." 

He ignored him. Went about removing the rest of his gear, removing the wolf's metaphorical teeth until it was just bloody gums, and wide eyes; the small, miniscule pinch of discomfort held at the corner of them all too satisfying.

Piling it all up, he left it beside the gathered folks who all, for once, said nothing. Not even the annoying ones had any quips or jibes or interjections to add to this. It was all narrowed eyes and clenched jaws and held tongues and he dragged Dream to his feet again. The man stumbled and kicked up sand and nearly fell flat on his face and he considered dropping him, letting him hit the beach like a sack of rocks, but he held tight, grip bruising, grip positively _crushing_ where he clung onto the man's arm like he had scruffed a dog he planned to kill. 

He threw him down at the edge of the water, watched Dream splutter on a nose and mouthful of seawater and struggle his way back onto his knees, panting and teeth bared. Salt stained spit fell from Dream's lips and he thought about how if he had seen an animal doing the same he would have sunk a knife between its eyes to halt the sickness in its drool. 

The water crashed and swelled, rolled like the blood in his ears, begged him to plant his hoof into Dream's sternum and kick. Pin him down into the waves and watch him drown in six inches of water, pathetic and pitiably. 

It wasn't his place to kill him. It wasn't his revenge to wrought. And killing him would do nothing anyway. 

Dream's eyes flicked between him and the crowd, back and forth and he watched the man connect the dots, figure out his intentions here and color lifted high on his cheeks. The man had the gall to look humiliated. Not even feel shame or disgust in himself. Dream just didn't like being seen. It's why he wore that stupid little mask, hid behind nonchalance and shrugs and tucked himself away in the corners of conflicts while he flicked TNT at the ground to spur on the battles. 

"So...This is it then? What if-- What if I asked for that favor now?"

He grunted, noncommittally, unamused. The favor didn't really matter now. Maybe he would usually believe in reciprocity, but that was null and void when he found out what Dream had been doing behind everyone's backs. 

"Why not just kill me?" 

"You know why," he answered flatly. If death was permanent maybe, but not in this place.

"You--" Dream clenched his jaw, eyes darting down to the sand and back up. "You _should_ kill me." 

"And why's that?" 

And he knew he had hook lined and sinkered himself when Dream grinned all wolfish and toothy. 

"Do you even know what I did to him? Did he tell you? He didn't, did he?" 

He had half a mind to clamp his hand over Dream's mouth, clench so hard his jaw and teeth shattered under his fist. Instead he let the man bark, let him metaphorically flail and kick and throw his little tantrum while he watched with disinterested eyes. 

"The, uh-- The first time, you should have seen his face. He didn't even know what was happening at first. Like--" Dream laughed. "How dumb can you be?" 

"Okay, that's enough." 

"He--" 

He grabbed Dream's shoulder so hard he heard something pop. "It'd be smart to stop talking if you wanna keep this arm." 

Dream swallowed, loud and audible. He patted him mockingly on the shoulder, withdrew and crossed his arms, took up post behind Dream, water lapping at his ankles and calves, so everyone could see him clearly. He didn't say anything, he only moved to grab Dream's shoulder every time the man wriggled or indicated he might try to do anything but stay kneeled and quiet. 

Tommy stumbled up to them after a bit, breathing heavy, eyes darting between him and Dream, and he had half a mind to tell the kid to scram, that he didn't need to be here for this. He let the kid stay though, wandered off so Tommy could have a moment alone, far enough he couldn't hear them, close enough he could step in if something happened as he crossed his arms and waited. 

There were moments where he thought about interrupting; when Tommy hunched and covered his ears, when Dream kept smiling and laughing and looking for all the world like he was prowling around the kid and not stuck on his knees. His lip twitched up when he watched Tommy punch Dream. An amused huff leaving him when Tommy did it again. It turned to a frown when he realized Tommy was shaking, trembling from head to toe like he was going to vibrate out of his skin. 

He stopped him, caught his fist before he could land another blow. And maybe he should have let Tommy keep going, but the shine in his eyes was a dangerous one. The shimmering film and red tinge betraying more distress and less satisfaction at the revenge. Like a dog who finally bit the hand that had fed it and hurt it in one and it realized it actually didn't like the taste of blood at all.

Tommy stumbled away to find Ranboo's journal, and he hauled Dream up by the scruff of his shirt and barely let the man get his feet under him (he knew they were probably numb and staticy from kneeling for so long, but he didn't really care). He paraded him down the shoreline, walked him in front of him, pulling back on the collar of his shirt and listening to Dream choke on his breath when the man strayed too far forward. 

This piece of shit had hurt Tommy. Had gone and done it all again with Ranboo, and had the audacity to smile and laugh at it. To not even feel an ounce of the fear he had pressed into either of the kid's faces, in all the lines that drew tight at the corners of their eyes and in the shake of a head that said _'im fine, I'm okay_ ' but trembled like a lie. And Dream had done that to them. He remembered the first time he saw Tommy again, after his exile, after he had found him cowered and backed into the wall, all clawing fingers and scrambling against the stone like Technoblade would kill him, would do _worse_ and he--

A thought, unbidden and born of red, of the voices chattering at his ears and nipping at him, fire ants where their jaws burned and sunk poison into him, rose from the depths. The next time Dream stumbled, he let him fall into the sand, wriggling and angry on his side, all larvae and pupae, and less wasp now that he'd ripped off the man's stinger. Struggling to his knees, Dream spit out sand, swiped his cheek against his shoulder and glared up at where he kneeled. 

"What the hell was that for?" 

"I had a thought..." 

Dream sneered. "Good to know you're not as dumb as you look, Techno, congrats."

Technoblade huffed out a breath, unclipped the axe at his side, watched Dream's eyes widen at the sight, at the noxious tint of netherite as he placed it under Dream's chin and tipped it up with the sharpened curve at the arc of the head. 

"If you're going to kill me..." Dream swallowed thickly and he watched his eyes bob up and down. "Then just do it." 

He huffed out a laugh. That was exactly what the little worm wanted. So he could wriggle his way back out of whatever dirt filled hole he had made his spawn point and disappear. 

"I'm not gonna kill you, Dream." 

"Then what--" 

"I owe you a favor, right?" 

Dream wrenched his head to the side, hissing through his teeth, and the trickle of blood that slid down his neck betrayed the nick he had carved into himself with the edge. Technoblade drew the axe back, smeared the heel of his palm through the small collection of crimson and contemplated swiping the bloody appendage on his tongue if not only to watch the little man squirm. It's not like blood was a foul taste to him. Iron sang against his lips as loudly as the voices that beckoned him to rend it from skin. But he didn't want this blood anywhere near his teeth, infected and poisoned as it was. 

"What-- What do you-- What are you getting at here?" 

"It's simple--" He crouched down, eye to eye with the kneeling man, patted him on the cheek like he was a child, hated every moment of the contact, but he reveled in the way Dream flinched at the condescension. "If you manage to get away from me, I'll let you go." 

"You--" Dream's eyes widened. 

He hauled the man to his feet, pushed him by the shoulder towards the forest rather than the rest of the shore. Dream stumbled back, eyes flicking between him and the tree line, arms squirming around where they were caught behind his back. 

"You're-- You're going to _hunt_ me?" Dream asked, sliding a step back, the blood from the small cut under his chin already clotted and dried like dripping rust.

"Uh… Something like that, sure." 

"What if you don't actually catch me?" 

"That's a risk I'm willing to take..." He hoisted up the axe, settled against his shoulder, and waited for Dream to make the first move. 

Dream took a cautious step back and he followed, hoof planting so hard into the sand he was sure, had Dream's skull been beneath it, he would have sunk down to grey matter. The man nearly jumped out of his skin, shoulders hiked up and wrists twisting in his bonds. And it was satisfying, satisfying in the way he squirmed and flinched at the sight of him in all the ways any quarry should. Ebbing and barking, braying at the sight of an injured calf; the voices called and demanded and wanted _blood._

"Run." 

The warning rumble bit out of him like a growl, low and deep from the pit of him and Dream backpedaled, nearly fell before turning and scrambling for the tree line. And he knew Dream wouldn't get far running like that, arms locked tight behind him, feet bare and soon to be bloodied and gashed open on the fingers of roots and rocks. He inhaled, deep and long and he could smell him; all animal and fear and pathetic. 

His trail was an obvious one. Clumsy and loud and blood scattered on the floor further in as the soles of his feet presumably became more pin board and less skin. Tree limbs left snapped, soft ground slid out and disturbed with the desperate weave of someone who thought they could outsmart him by doubling back over tracks or taking sharp turns. It didn't matter, it was all futile. He would be able to smell his blood for miles if he really set his mind to it. 

The trail ended, swept clean, underbrush mostly clear of damage, no foot tracks revealing themselves in the low glare of moonlight, and he flexed his hand around the axe handle. And then looked up. 

The sharp intake of air, the inhale of a spotted animal as it went deadly still, all of it was amusing, as if he couldn't see Dream crouched on the tree limb above him. Hands maneuvered in front of him and clinging to the bough under him, wrists still bound to one another, but the little shit had somehow managed to wrangle them forward. 

"You gonna come down on your own or do you want me to drag you down?" 

"Technically, you-- I mean, you still haven't caught me yet, so--" 

He sunk the axe so far into the bough the crack split like thunder and Dream flinched, balance wobbling beneath bloody feet. Leaving the axe lodged in the branch he grabbed the nearest handhold and hoisted himself up, hooves catching in the rough texture of the bark as he swiped for Dream's ankle. The man tried to stand, to back away on the branch, nearly doubled over as he threatened to topple, and it didn't really matter as his hand closed around the calf of Dream's trousers and he yanked. 

The high yelping cry that yipped from Dream cut off with a choking cough as the man slammed into the ground. It swirled into a groan as Dream rolled onto his back and coughed again. 

"Fu-- Wha-- What the hell?" Dream bit out around laboured breaths. 

He really hoped Dream had cracked a rib or two from the fall alone. 

He wrenched his axe out of the tree and returned it to his belt, loomed over Dream and picked at the dried blood on his hand. "Looks like you lost the manhunt this time." 

Dream grit his teeth, bared them up at him like he was supposed to feel threatened by the little display and he hauled him up by his bound wrists. Didn't let Dream catch his feet beneath him before he pinned Dream against the tree the man had thought would save him and wrenched the rope off his wrists. Ignored the hiss pushed through Dream's teeth as rope burns raised like welts against his forearms, turned the man around by his shoulder and roughly redid his bonds so they were behind him once more. Tied them so tight and so far up that if he thought about slipping them under himself and in front of him again, he would crack a shoulder blade first. 

And for once, Dream was quiet. No quip. No stupid jibe. No sharp smile, no witty comeback or remark about Tommy or anyone he had hurt. It was just resigned silence. And finally, for the first time, he could see the defeat settled over the man's shoulders, smugness cracked open for the pathetic visage of a struggling roach, stuck on its back, legs flailing in the air. 

He marched him back to the shore, ignored the way Dream limped, bloodied footprints left impressed into the grass and the sand, walked him into the brush of the sea so that salt lapped its way into the wounds and Dream tensed under his hand. It was nothing compared to every ounce of hurt he had seen stamped and marked into Ranboo's skin like a fucked up essay Dream had written, last minute and into midnight and with the desperation of someone determined not to lose something he couldn't control anymore. Nothing compared to the way Tommy had looked the day he found him, dull and hollow and blues more like the lost vastness of a sky that hadn't seen clouds in so long it forgot you could track shapes in them, could smile at the sight of them. 

This was nothing compared to that. Miniscule. Infinitesimal. A fraction of the fear and pain. Nothing would ever surmount to the crime, there were no equal dues here, just the idea that no matter how many ways he treated Dream like shit it would never be the same. 

The prison finally loomed, stalwart and unmoving against the waves that butted up against it and demanded entry into its non-existent doors. He walked him down the hall of the portal entrance Sam had made, marble and obsidian echoing around them, Dream's breaths harsh and loud in the chamber. He pushed him through the portal, let him fall through and didn't catch him, stepped through to the clicking sound of teeth on teeth as Dream struck the ground chin first and groaned. 

He grabbed him up again, by the upper arm this time, hoofed fingers dug into the muscle so tight he hoped there would be a band of bruising there for weeks. Sam had told him the path he needed to take, the steps to get in, all of it, and he went through the routine while Dream twisted his head to and fro, like he had never seen the place even though he's the one that had asked for it to be built. 

He lead him past the levered door, past the first cells, more towards the heart of the prison, to the center of the labyrinth where there was as much wall and obsidian between Dream and the outside world as possible.

"He cried, you know..." Dream said casually, like he wasn't being escorted to a cell, like the both of them were just out on a stroll. 

"What?" And he didn't know if Dream meant Ranboo or Tommy, but it didn't really matter either way, it was all--

"When I--" Dream paused and shrugged. "I mean… I _knew_ he was a virgin, but he sobbed like a little kid. He told me it hurt. He asked me to stop. Hell... he _begged_ me to stop." Dream laughed. 

His knuckles were driving into Dream's face before he could even rethink it. Dream coughed, burbled and crowed with more wheezing laughs and he sounded unhinged. He drove his fist up into his jaw again, so hard he heard a crack and the man's shoulders collided with the obsidian, skull thwacking back into the stone with a thud. Blood pulsed out of the corner of the man's lips and Dream spit off to the side, the slight ping of something striking the stone made him realize he had knocked out a tooth. Dream smiled around red stained teeth and he couldn't help but pin the bastard to the wall by his throat, fingers digging into his windpipe until all he could do was gag. 

He could do it. He could snap his neck, turn his spine until it twisted and he fell limp. It would be easy, too easy, Dream was all bravado and explosives and no substance, no grit, it was like putty under his hands for how easy it would be to just-- 

A hand grabbed his wrist and he stiffened, dropped Dream where he had hiked him further up the wall, until his toes had nearly left the floor, and he shook the fingers off, turned to see Sam watching him. Face impassive and unreadable. 

"He's all yours..." he muttered, all but tossing Dream towards him.

He stooped to pick up the bloodied molar, listened to Sam drag Dream off further into the corridors, and considered the little piece of bone in his palm. It would have been so easy to just-- He curled his fist around the tooth and squeezed until it hurt.

His trek back from the prison meandered off course until he was back at the beach, standing where the sea had washed out the impressions of where Dream had been forced to kneel, like he had never been there in the first place. He looked over to the tent, still standing, and contemplated breaking it down, tossing it back into the crater beside it. It wasn't his place to tear it to shreds. If Tommy wanted to come back and do that himself-- Heck, if the kid wanted to burn the whole thing to the ground, he'd gladly help him. 

No one had wanted to collect Dream's things apparently. He didn't really blame them. He didn't even want to, but someone had to get the litter off the beach. Stuffed in a sack he brought all of it home, tossed it into a corner for later, and went about making sure Tommy was okay. 

Their conversation was a halted and stuttering one, full of starts and stops, of Tommy having a panic attack and clinging onto his arm for dear life and him reeling, for the first time since he was a child, completely powerless. There wasn't anything to fight here. No monster to kill, no beast to hunt down and tie up and skin. It was just… He couldn't kill the thing still stalking around in Tommy's head and that made him feel-- 

Useless. 

Tommy retreated down to his room-- Well, his and Ranboo's room now. And it was weird to label it their room. It was still his basement. Still his property. But that part of it, that room, maybe it wouldn't be the same without the beds and the belongings and the people in it. It would just be empty and cold and lifeless. 

He sighed, letting the weight finally bow his back, spine curving, all of it crashing down on him like a wave springing forth from the froth of the sea itself to barrel him over. This-- He wasn't cut out for this. Phil came back up after a bit and when he looked up at him, from where he still sat, not trusting his limbs to hold both him and the weight of everything else, the other nodded; tight and terse, lips thinned, eyes pinched. 

The two down below would be okay. Okay in all the ways they could be provided for. With food and shelter and a warm fire to sit beside. A helping hand offered if they needed it. But he couldn't guarantee they would be okay in all the other ways. That uncertainty slipped from his grasp like an oiled rope, fast and hissing and burning his hands on the way out. 

A hand landed on his shoulder, Phil crouched in front of him and he bowed his head, let it fall against the other's sternum and he breathed, shaky and uneven and like he was more crumbling stone and less flesh and blood.

"They'll be okay..." Phil's words rumbled under his forehead and he tried to hold onto the way it tumbled like thunder rolling across the sky. 

"I could've done something sooner. I knew Tommy was-- I knew he hadn't had a great time in exile, Phil. I never thought it was--" He stopped and started, and words were usually so easy. 

Words were a weapon he wielded with sharp wit and a sharper tongue, sharper even than any sword or axe or tip of a bolt. But they failed him here. Dulled and blunted against the edge of a battle he didn't know how to fight. 

"You did what you could, Techno." 

Phil cupped a hand over the back of his neck and he was the only one who ever got to do that. Anyone else he would have snapped their wrist, twisted the bones in their arms so far they'd pop out of their skin. And they rested like that, the quiet between them, his face hidden against Phil's chest like he was a child, like he couldn't face the monster in the closet on his own. 

When he finally drew back, breathed in air that seared his lungs and popped along with the crackle of the fire, Phil waited, still crouched in front of him. And his legs had to hurt by now, his knees probably aching, wings drooped behind him where they usually stood, tall and menacing and snapped out like sails. It was just them. Two idiots who knew everything about how to kill a man and nothing about how to save one. 

"I'm gonna mess this up." 

Phil chuckled. "Probably, but doesn't everyone?" 

"Says the guy who killed his own son." 

Phil grimaced. "That's fair." 

He sighed, kneading at his eyes. 

"Tired?" Phil asked. 

"Naw, just a headache. It's been…" 

"A long day?" 

"That." 

"Yeah... Maybe try and get some rest, mate." 

"Are you going back to L'Manberg?" He tried to ask it in a way that didn't sound desperate. 

That didn't sound like he needed Phil to stay, because what if Tommy or Ranboo had a panic attack, what if one of them hurt themselves, how was he supposed to watch over one kid, let alone two? 

"I can stay." 

"Oh… Uh, you off house arrest then?" 

"Tubbo removed all charges. I'm a free man." 

Technoblade huffed out an amused breath. "Well, uh… Welcome to your new house arrest. Helping me make sure these kids don't drink bleach or trip on knives or something equally dumb." 

"You should probably look into child proofing the cabin." Phil joked. 

He actually laughed at that. "No amount of child proofing will keep Tommy from digging into whatever thing he sets his sticky little paws to." 

"He has a bit of a knack for that, yeah?" 

"Hopefully he, uh... doesn't find where I stashed the wine this time." 

Phil raised a brow. 

He waved him off. "I'm not telling you, he's probably listening in right now. He's got the ears of a rodent." 

Phil laughed and he latched onto that. The little breathy chimes of it. The man stood first, offering him a hand and he eyed it. He should probably head for sleep like the rest of the world. There was a lot to smooth out tomorrow. But he turned his head back towards the hearth, eyeing the dead flames, the logs smoldering and coughing weak puffs of smoke. Phil didn't pry, didn't ask questions, just retreated with the understanding that for now he wasn't following. 

He sighed. Buried his face in his hands, and without even Phil there, he finally let a shudder wrack his shoulders. He didn't cry. He hadn't cried in so long, so long he didn't even think he could, but he could shake and tremble and his throat could close up like he was caught in the smoke of a house fire, timbers snapping and cracking around him. It took too long to unbury himself, to shrug off the smoldering boards and pry his hands from his face and stand in the wake of it all.

He headed for the ladder, to go to the ground floor, where his bed and his room and a night's rest waited. His hooves stalled, eyes roving to the burlap sack he had discarded. He should probably hide that. If Tommy or Ranboo wandered up and got curious, it wouldn't be so good for them to find it. Grabbing it up, he contemplated what to do with all of the things inside. 

Spilling them out onto the floor he rummaged through what was useful, what was useless, dividing a line between what he could salvage and what would be tossed into the fire. The enderpearls, knife, redstone filaments, sticks of TNT and small little explosives like cherry bombs all went into the reusable pile. Those didn't feel intrinsically connected to the face, to the man who had smirked at him and, in vicious brevity, described how one of them, Ranboo or Tommy, didn't matter, just the way he had said they cried when he-- 

His fist clenched. He wished he had knocked out more of his teeth. 

The useless things were the boots and the mask, the buckles wrenched and twisted where he had pulled the thing off of Dream's face. The leathers and cross body harness, the utility belt, gloves, and he wasn't sure how one man could have so many buckles and junk. He dug through the pouches he hadn't already excavated, felt his skin crawl when he pulled out little reminders that Dream was still just a person under all the things he had done.

He plucked free an envelope, folded by hand and less than neatly done, that had been tucked at the bottom of a larger leather side pouch, big enough to hold a book, but empty besides that. It must've been where Tommy found Ranboo's journal then. 

He set the makeshift envelope down, considered never opening it, never finding out what was in it. He didn't really want to know. It shifted and rattled, the thunk, thunk of something flat, thin, square and of solid substance shifting from corner to corner rang in his ears. His skin crawled, the fur on his neck, on his shoulders, standing on end as he opened it and dumped its guts out onto the floorboards. Glancing over the contents he--

He found the edge of the bucket beside the door before he even knew where he was. Hunched over, panting, he wrestled with the nausea, with the sickening realization that those were photos, square polaroid slips. That Dream had-- 

He needed to burn those. _Immediately._ Just-- He scooped up everything he considered garbage and tossed it into the fire. The stench of burnt leathers and plastics and materials that probably shouldn't even be burned tickled at his nose and he added more fuel to the fire for good measure, poked and prodded and made sure it all got eaten up and turned to ash. He didn't breathe easier until it was all gone, until it vanished into nothing. 

He crawled upstairs, he tried to toss out everything in his head and forget all of it as he slipped under the sheets beside an already slumbering Phil and stared at the ceiling. Sleep probably wasn't going to happen to him tonight. He listened to Phil breath beside him, latched onto the sound so hard it swam and ebbed in his ears. He didn't want to think about-- He didn't want to think about-- 

And the voices chattered, buzzing and flitting and annoying in his ears. He covered them, pressed his palms against the sides of his head as if it would stop them. He didn't want to think about how Dream had-- How there were pictures-- About how it was-- About how he wanted to scrub at his brain so hard it went from wrinkled to polished smooth-- 

A hand fell on his forearm and he jumped, relaxing only when he realized it was Phil and not someone here to drive a knife through his sternum. He let the man draw his hands away from his ears, let Phil twine his fingers with his own and rest them on the bed between them, the flight feathers of Phil's wing draped along him and he focused on the non-existent weight of them. 

"Techno?" 

His fingers spasmed, tightening around Phil's and he turned onto his side to face him, brows drawn and crumpled. 

"He-- I went through his things and he--" 

"What?" 

"We should have killed him, Phil. We should have--" 

Phil's hand squeezed his. "If we did he would have just come back. He wouldn't have let us catch him a second time. You know that."

His jaw clenched, teeth grinding, tusks bumping one another in an audible click."I know, but--" 

"He can't get out of there and we know where he is now. We know he can't hurt them from there..." 

"Yeah…" He slipped his hand out of Phil's grasp, turned over so Phil couldn't see the way his fist trembled.

A hand butted up against his spine, resting there, knuckles lightly pressed into his back, a reminder, at least, that he wasn't alone. He stared at the wall, stared until he thought it would buckle under the intensity of it. Maybe he should have killed Dream. Skinned him alive on the beach and then gutted him like the mangy little creature he was. 

There was a measure in metaphorically gutting him though. Forcing him to kneel there and know that all of his little friends-- all the people who had ever talked to him or joked with him or sat down and had meals with him and invited him into their homes-- got to see what he really was. Hubris stripped back for the putrid, infected innards of a monster. 

At least, he had put him in a cage... Locked him in his own little labyrinth to rot. And if he ever got out-- he clenched his jaw, fist curling tighter-- he would run him through himself.

**Author's Note:**

> Uh. Yeah. So I still plan on writing a part focused on recovery and them finally having good times. It might be a bit. Some clown happened in the comment sections (all the comments made have been deleted) and it kind of redirected me a bit. So hyperfixation on this has kind of clicked off... But I still plan to write the healing part, just gonna take me longer. 
> 
> Thanks for sticking around.


End file.
